M. Night Shyamalan's latest effort The Happening is a cinematic train wreck and, indirectly, Al Gore is to blame. The wannabe thriller begins with a solid, curiosity provoking premise as most of his movies do and starts down the tracks very intriguingly.  Then about 30-45 minutes in, the wheels begin to screech and by the 60 minute mark the train has derailed into a fiery, ecologically paranoid disaster that is insulting, disappointing and proves yet again that Shyamalan is a one-hit wonder and can make a career and money off of reputation alone.

Here are the basics of the plot to placate the curious.  A mysterious epidemic has  grasped the national attention.  It starts in New York with people, for no reason, turning catatonic then committing suicide.  It spreads slowly throughout the Northeast like a persistent plague until the region has reached a panic stage and survival becomes the number one priority.  Elliott (Mark Wahlberg) is a Philadelphia high school science teacher (of course) who escapes with his wife (Zooey Deschanel),  best friend and fellow teacher Julian (John Leguizamo) and Julian's young daughter. The remainder of the film is supposed to be a journey  to escape the mysterious threat and find answers to what is causing all of this. 

Frankly once I did know, I really didn't care.  The foreshadowing made me hope and pray that it wasn't the direction the film would take but sadly, it did. You would think I would have learned my lesson by now regarding his films.  I have preached and ranted about this before, after Unbreakable and Signs specifically, but there is something inside me that still holds onto the sheer dramatic brilliance of The Sixth Sense and therefore gives him another chance.  The formula is the same every time;

      Tease the audience with chilling idea leaving an air of mystery to pique curiosity and draw us in. -  This time it is a mysterious "affliction" causing numerous people to act in an abnormal manner.   

      Give the film some validity by casting recognizable, even critically acclaimed,  stars to lend credibility. – In this case its Oscar nominee Wahlberg Leguizamo, both of whom have not been subjected to Shyamalan's torturous methods before and now, like most others, probably will not ever again. .

      Start the film off with tension-inducing moments to increase the intrigue as to the "cause" of the events. – In this case it is chilling and at times gruesome series of scenes involving the several people in parks all acting in a similar manner resulting in their deaths to which there is no immediate or plausible explanation. Then the introduction of theories as to the cause only heightens the tension and keep the audiences watching. 

      Have a surprise/shocking/out of left field explanation for the occurrences. – This one actually varies from film to film. Sometimes it comes at the end of the film (Sixth Sense, The Village, Signs) and sometimes, as in this film, it comes earlier. This is the films make or break point.  It was what took Sixth Sense from a great thriller to an exceptional mentally stimulating piece of cinematic art.  It is here that the wind goes completely out of the sails and the film loses any potential or credibility.   

I get what the intention of the story.  We are killing the environment and now the environment is retaliating (Episode 6: The Environment Strikes Back) He wanted to make a thriller that would scare people because the possibility exists for it to really happen.  The thing that frightens most people is the unknown of reality. The greater the chance of something happening, the more likely people are to be afraid of it.  One consistency about Shyamalan is that he plays on natural fears and attempts to translate them into entertainment.  We are afraid of ghosts, of aliens and things that go bump in the night but now he is attempting to capitalize on the "green" movement and scare us into saving the planet.  My complaint is not on the idea but on the way he goes about it.  If you want to make a statement then do it, as An Inconvenient Truth did. In general, people respond better to blunt, direct statements rather than veiled attempts to motivate through fear.  But it seems the prevailing belief, amongst those with influence and power, is that the only way to instill change is through fear, best stated in The Culture of Fear by Barry Glassner.  But thus I digress.The only thing that kept me watching and interested was the prospect of this initial explanation being a red herring to an ever bigger (and definitely better) explanation.   There are initial theories proposed, the most intriguing of which involved potential terrorist attacks.  I could have lived with that.  Hell, I could have accepted something fictional like an alien attack but having it become a platform for saving the environment was not only preachy; it was a slap to my morality and intelligence.  

Assessing the performances almost seems futile since most of the actors sleep walk through the roles and honestly look like they would rather be elsewhere.  Wahlberg and Deschanel have the most screen time and couldn't look more bored or cardboard.  They have no chemistry, no real sense of fear and feign any emotions they have for the sake of getting it over with.  They almost look envious of the characters, such as Leguizamo,  that did die because they knew that at least they had escaped or the ones who had little screen time (what was Cameron (Alan Ruck) doing in this film, although it was a humorous bit of irony that he played a high school principal.) The ones who died early, regardless of the manner and gruesome nature of their demise, were definitely the lucky ones.  

Ultimately, The Happening is a breathless piece of cinematic deception whose intention may have been to promote environmental awareness but instead ends up being a lot of hot air.  I definitively believe in the importance of saving our planet and doing anything necessary to do so, I also believe that every attempt should be made to make sure that as many people as possible know about it.  But disguising this message within a movie and trying subliminal manipulation is offensive and unnecessary.  . Shyamalan seems to find new ways to put out bad movies with each progressive effort.  All are usually centered on some sort of fear-based intention.   The film is its own form of artistic pollution by trying to scare viewers into caring. The only thing this movie makes me afraid of is spending another penny on any more of his films.    By the conclusion all I could honestly do was laugh uncontrollably and ponder other more productive things I could have to save the planet in those two hours. ($ out of $$$$$)